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Donald Trump recently named prominent white nationalist Stephen Bannon, his former campaign chief, “chief strategist and senior counselor” of his White House team. The appointment represents an infiltration of white supremacism into the highest levels of government that has not been seen since the pre-civil rights era.

Despite Trump’s constant fantasies of collusion between the “mainstream media” and the Democratic Party, Bannon, who has been an integral part of Trump’s team all along, is the head of the far-right news site Breitbart.

Even worse than Trump’s co-optation of the fourth estate, however, is the character of the man he chose to do so. Bannon’s Breitbart has become, in his own words, “the platform for the alt-right,” the movement of far-right online white supremacy that has gained so much attention this campaign. Bannon is a prominent admirer of Richard Bertrand Spencer, the bigoted white ultranationalist who coined the term alt-right and has become somewhat of a sage for the movement while advocating “peaceful ethnic cleansing”. The Anti-Defamation league has called him “a symbol of the new white supremacy” and the SPLC labeled him “a suit-and-tie version of the white supremacists of old.” Bannon himself has reportedly said, rather paradoxically, that the only difference between himself and skinheads is “intelligence.”

Indeed the alt-right is a strange phenomenon. Driven by everything from racial hatred to sexual frustration, the amorphous online movement calls for ethnic cleansing to stave off a “white genocide,” believes liberals are engaged in a clandestine war to eradicate freedom of speech – which in their minds equates largely to freedom to harass women and insult minorities – and grants equal ideological weight to the Syrian civil war (in which they support the genocidal Bashar al-Assad and his Russian backers) and internal video game politics.

Now, one of the leaders of this bigoted “new white supremacy” will literally be a leading figure in the White House. Even hardline conservatives like Glenn Beck and Ben Shapiro have denounced the white nationalism of Bannon and Spencer as “shot through with racism and anti-Semitism,” but a fundamental respect for human dignity no longer seems to be a prerequisite for occupying the highest office in the land.

Sure enough Trump’s election has been greeted with euphoria from white supremacists around the country, with endorsements coming pouring in from the KKK and other hate groups. Speaking of Trump, Spencer himself said “He’s fighting for us. He’s saying we’re going to be great again. We’re going to win again. And there’s this implicit identity to this. There’s this implicit nationalism. I think he’s evoking a lot of feelings amongst people, and I think implicit in what Donald Trump is doing is a conception of America as a European country.”

When such openly and proudly bigoted people are being chosen to run the country, it is no surprise that oppressed communities nationwide are genuinely frightened for their safety. The hundreds of hate crimes committed in the days since Trump’s election (an even worse increase than after 9/11) give an even stronger impetus to fight back against the agents of fascism that no longer lie dormant in the American body politic. We as a nation are truly entering new and dangerous territory, and we need to do everything we can to resist and stand up for human rights.

Retailers have begun ditching Ivanka's brand under the growing pressure of the anti-Trump boycott.

Shoes.com, a Canadian online shoe store, became the first retailer to announce it was dropping Ivanka Trump's shoe line last week, following the GrabYourWallet campaign.

Shannon Coulter kicked off the boycott on October 11, a reference to Trump's now famous 'grab them by the p***y' remark from the audio tape and numerous allegations of sexual assault by the president-elect.

Since then, she has been joined by a growing group of women who are boycotting Ivanka's eponymous line of clothing, jewelry, perfume and accessories over her support for her father.

They have also called on the stores that carry the brand, including Nordstrom, Bloomingdale's and Macy's, to stop selling the line. Retailers who refuse to dump the brand, have also joined the list of boycotted companies.

And it seems the boycott is beginning to bite.

Last week, Shoes.com became the first firm to announce that it was removing Ivanka Trump products.

While the official reason given for dropping the brand was that, 'they were not selling well,' on Twitter Shoes.com responded to the #GrabYourWallet boycotters, saying that it had heard their voices.

'We understand and your voices have been heard. We have removed the products from our website,' Shoes.com tweeted on November 12.

'We want to support our customers make sure than can continue to stand tall.'

Interestingly, those tweets have since been deleted while Ivanka's line has not returned to Shoes.com.

Coulter also tweeted that furniture and interior store Bellacor had quietly removed all its Trump products after the company was added to the boycott list.

Yet while some retailers appear to have been swayed by #GrabYourWallet, others have refused to bow down to the pressure of the campaign.

Earlier this month, Nordstrom responded to boycott, saying it has no plans to pull the brand and they will continue to allow customers 'to choices about what they purchase based on personal views.'

'We hope that offering a vendor's products isn't misunderstood as us taking a political position; we're not. We recognize,' a spokesman added in a tweet.

Since announcing his candidacy, Trump's retail collaborations have reportedly suffered but Ivanka's clothing line, which had a sales revenue exceeding 100million last year, is growing, according to Forbes.

At Fortune's Most Powerful Women conference, Ivanka suggested evidence of brand decline surrounding her family's business was unreliable.

'We're one of the fastest growing luxury hotel companies in the world,' she said, according to Forbes.

She also insisted that she had 'always tried to maintain complete separation between [my brand] and the campaign.' But many have questioned that stance after Ivanka's company sent a fashion alert ad about a $10,800 gold bracelet she wore during a '60 Minutes' interview about Trump's presidential plans.

Critics questioned whether a news interview was the place to promote her brand and asked whether she was using her father's political gains to further her own company.

'That action on her part revealed in full the crass commercialism of Ivanka Trump as well as how false claim that her primary role here is that of daughter,' Coulter told CBS News.

'Anyone who criticized Hillary Clinton for cultivating a pay-to-play culture at the Clinton Foundation but isn't offended by Ivanka Trump's hawking of a $10,800 diamond bracelet just after a '60 Minutes' interview with her father is a hypocrite.'

Many women also felt that they could no longer separate Ivanka from her father's politics.

As Coulter explained in an interview with Cosmopolitan, '[women] were ready to give Ivanka a pass because she's his [Trump's] daughter and it's hard to be objective about your dad.'

However, after the tape, women took particular offense 'to the fact that Ivanka tries to make feminism a part of her brand but is standing by, as an official campaign surrogate, a guy who is an alleged serial sexual assaulter of women,' according to Coulter.

'The disconnect was too big. And they were ready to speak up about it and flex their consumer power about it,' the San Francisco-based brand and digital strategist said.

Coulter says that the boycott has picked up steam since Trump's surprise election win as many consumers seek a way to register their disappointment in the Republican's victory.

The campaign is also targeting brands that have aligned themselves with Trump.

New Balance is facing huge backlash after the company reportedly voiced support for the president-elect.

Customers began throwing away their sneakers or lighting them on fire last week in protest after a New Balance spokesman told Wall Street Journal on Wednesday: 'Frankly w/ Pres-Elect Trump we feel things are going to move in the right direction.'

Things got worse for the Boston-based brand after the alt-right website The Daily Stormer proclaimed New Balance the 'Official Shoes of White People'.

New Balance have since tried to distance itself from its white supremacist support and released a statement on Monday saying it 'does not tolerate bigotry or hate in any form.'

But that hasn't stopped furious New Balance customers trashing their shoes in protest against the athletic company's election stance.

'Flexing our consumer power is one of the primary ways we can lobby for an inclusive, big-hearted America over a hateful, divisive one,' Coulter noted. 'College educated women in particular are well aware of the epic consumer power they wield, and they're flexing that power.'

Rudolph Giuliani, a possessed sack of human flesh and crooked teeth, wants to take up the cyber reins in President-elect Donald Trump’s administration. Installing someone with such questionable experience would likely be a complete disaster for America’s cybersecurity woes.

“I’d love to become the person that comes up with a solution to cybersecurity,” America’s most influential gremlin said this morning on Fox News.

Giuliani probably thinks he’s the right guy to fix this problem because he and his friend started a cybersecurity company in 2005. But this embarrassing Marketwatch interview with Giuliani from January reveals he probably has no idea what he’s talking about. The interview makes it seem like Giuliani is more a savvy business person who cashed in on the emerging issue of cybersecurity, rather than someone who has deep knowledge of the issues. More on this in a second.

Let’s make one thing clear: Strong cybersecurity and a Trump administration are not compatible.Cybersecurity, and especially cybersecurity policy, requires patience, hiring smart people, a deep and thorough understanding of the issues, and a commitment to privacy and security.

“Only by understanding technology and its vulnerabilities can policymakers successfully address online threats without creating new, more significant risks. In any cybersecurity discussions, policymakers must include technologists as well as the people whose safety and security are most directly affected,” Drew Mitnick, policy counsel at Access, told Gizmodo. “They must also act with the understanding that the rights that exist offline, such as privacy and freedom of expression, exist equally as strongly online.”

These things are not qualities that Donald Trump—or his goons—are known for embracing. When the FBI made the unprecedented move of demanding Apple subvert its own security features by building a tool to gain access to San Bernardino shooter Syed Farook’s iPhone (a case that the FBI later dropped) Trump’s first reaction was to “boycott Apple.” This is not an intelligent response to the challenges surrounding encryption and law enforcement.

But back to Giuliani’s train wreck of an interview about cybersecurity. The core premise of Giuliani’s cybersecurity philosophy seems to be throwing money at the problem. Like most other issues, throwing money at the wrong solution can actually make the problem worse, and that couldn’t be more true when it comes to cybersecurity. Here’s a selection from the transcript:

Marketwatch: Was cybersecurity ever a concern while you were mayor?Giuliani: It wasn’t as great of an issue then because we weren’t digitized. We got digitized for Y2K. We spent $300 million on Y2K. They told me computers were going to change when the millennium hit. Then we had all these people who said all sorts of crazy things — the subways would stop running, the jails would get emptied, the moon would fall. We basically had to back up all of our systems. Y2K comes, Y2K goes, no problem. For the next year, all I do is harangue them for costing me that $300 million. Then Sept. 11 happened. I said, we should have spent $500 million. We recreated our emergency management center in 2.5 hours after it was destroyed.﻿﻿

For those who want a little insight into Giuliani’s decision-making process, you may remember that, as mayor, he decided to place New York City’s emergency command center in the World Trade Center, despite objections from a panel of police experts and the Secret Service.

The Marketwatch interview does little to show off Giuliani’s understanding of cybersecurity issues, and more to make him seems like a greedy bastard looking to line his own pockets.

MW: So Giuliani Partners began penetration-testing companies — attacking from the outside to find vulnerabilities hackers may exploit — back in 2003?RG: 2004, 2005 by the time we got started.MW: How many clients did you have back then?RG: Maybe 30.MW: Did you find that anyone cared about cybersecurity back then?RG: These were all friends of mine, friends of his. They’d give me a nice meeting and they’d look at me, and they’d look at the bill. And the bill was high, but it wasn’t high for them — $10 million, $20 million, something like that. It wasn’t like the kind of money they’re spending now. (laughs)﻿﻿

So, because Giuliani made a bunch of money selling expensive cybersecurity services to his friends in the early 2000s—when the state of cybersecurity was completely different as it is today— he thinks he would be well equipped to tackle the multiple facets of America’s cybersecurity issue.

Giuliani has always been a clown, but the idea of him leading America’s cybersecurity push as we go deeper into the digital age is nothing short of terrifying.

A Massachusetts county sheriff has proposed sending prison inmates from around the United States to build the proposed wall along the Mexican border that is one of U.S. President-elect Donald Trump's most prominent campaign promises.

"I can think of no other project that would have such a positive impact on our inmates and our country than building this wall," Bristol County Sheriff Thomas Hodgson said at his swearing-in ceremony for a fourth term in office late Wednesday.

"Aside from learning and perfecting construction skills, the symbolism of these inmates building a wall to prevent crime in communities around the country, and to preserve jobs and work opportunities for them and other Americans upon release, can be very powerful," he said.

Hodgson, who like Trump is a Republican, said inmates from around the country could build the proposed wall, described by Trump as a powerful deterrent to illegal immigration.

Trump, who will be sworn in on Jan. 20, insisted during his campaign that he would convince the Mexican government to pay for the wall, though Mexican officials have repeatedly said they would not do so.

Officials in the Trump transition office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The United States has a long history of prison labor, with advocates of the idea saying that putting inmates to work can help them learn skills that prepare them for their return to society after completing their sentences. Opponents contend that inmates are not fairly compensated.

The federal prisons system operates some 53 factories around the United States that produced about $500 million worth of clothing, electronics, furniture and other goods in the fiscal year ended Sept. 30, according to its financial statements.

Still, an attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union in Massachusetts said Hodgson's proposal could violate prisoners' rights.

"The proposal is perverse, it's inhumane and very likely unconstitutional," ACLU staff counsel Laura Rotolo said in a phone interview. "It certainly has nothing to do with helping prisoners in Massachusetts or their families. It's about politics."

In response to a request by the Trump transition office, the Department of Homeland Security last month identified more than 400 miles (644 km) along the U.S.-Mexico border where new fencing could be erected, according to a document seen by Reuters.

The document contained an estimate that building that section of fence would cost more than $11 billion.

‘Go Back To Mexico’ Sentiment Is Most Prevalent In States That Used To Be Mexico

By John Paul Brammer - August 21, 2015

Consider the states you associate most with anti-Latino sentiment.

You might first think of Arizona, of Maricopa County in particular, where Sheriff Joe Arpaio was accused and found guilty of racially profiling Latinos.

Or perhaps you might think of Texas, the state where, according to conservatives, Mexicans are diluting American culture by refusing to learn English and turning San Antonio into a Mexican metropolis.

California might also enter your mind – Latinos are now the majority there, a fact that, when it was reported, royally freaked out conservatives. It’s as if they know that minorities are typically mistreated or something.

The point is, the anti-Latino word bank of your typical xenophobe will likely include: “border, undocumented, alien, illegal, fence,” etc. So it makes sense that the states most associated with anti-Latino sentiment would be Border States.

But these states have something else in common too. They all used to be Mexico.

I say this not as a scary Mexican seeking Reconquista. I’m not advocating that we give these states back to Mexico.

No, I say this is as someone who has looked at a map, and as a Latino who is tired of hearing conservatives say “go back to Mexico” while standing on land that used to be Mexico.

It’s hypocritical.

The story of the land you and I call America is more complicated than your high school history books probably suggested.

Conquest, mixing of the races, genocide, independence movements, separatist movements within those independence movements, annexations, boundaries that were drawn and redrawn – it’s enough to make your head spin.

Which is why we must approach these issues with nuance and with a clear grasp of history.

But telling a Mexican-American that they are “diluting” American culture in Texas, for example, and telling them to “go back to Mexico” is ignorant of this history.

Because in that case, and I really hate to break this to you… you’re the one who showed up and diluted the culture.

The reactions of many Americans to the Trump victory is a symptom of their political immaturity.

By Malak Chabkoun - 10 November 2016

Many Americans woke up on November 9 (or didn't sleep to begin with) panicking about the future of the United States.

Citizens of other countries, particularly in the Arab world, were probably observing this mass panic with a smirk, thinking, "and now it's their turn". Certainly, not out of spite, but in the hope that Americans would finally understand where they were coming from.

The reality is, citizens of the US - minorities or otherwise - do have reasons to feel fear and disgust under a Trump presidency, not only from his proposed policies of alienation and repression, but also from those supporters of his, whose white power aspirations have now been made official.

However, it is also true that citizens of the US, particularly Arabs and Muslims, must not allow this election result to force them to act as frightened children.

Murmurs of migrating to Canada if Trump won apparently translated into reality, with the Canadian immigration website reportedly crashing as it became clear the electoral college votes were in his favour.

These reactions make one pause and wonder how long these same people would last under the Arab and African dictatorships and occupiers the US has propped up and maintained positive ties with over the years.

We now have a version of a "dictator-elect" in the US, and rather than promising to fight the changes he has threatened to implement, the initial reaction of many Americans has been to plot ways to flee.

Honestly, the arrogance of Americans who are threatening to flee is breathtaking. They assume that the world will now welcome them with open arms because in a few months, they will be ruled by a less-than-desirable leader. One which, the world will be quick to mention, was actually chosen by Americans and not imposed on them by occupation or intervention.

Political immaturity

As young elementary school pupils in the US, we are programmed during our "social studies" classes to hold our civic duties, such as voting and obeying laws, near and dear.

In middle and high school and even college, we run for "political office", setting up small governments within our schools that give us an illusion of holding power.

Schools hold mock voting days and colleges invite political officials to come and encourage American students - young and old - to be active participants in the political process.

Even naturalised citizens of the US go through a political socialisation process; one that details their rights and responsibilities as a citizen of the US and reminds them that citizenship is a promise to commit to the US and its form of government.

Yet, all of this political socialisation has apparently left us unprepared to deal with the sometimes unexpected and undesirable outcomes of the US' version of democracy.

In fact, our reactions to the results of the 2016 election have shown us exactly how our political socialisation has failed us and made us complacent and passive rather than proactive members of our political system. But this is only one small symptom of our political immaturity and decay in the US.

Ignorant of suffering

Contrary to what we may believe, we Americans aren't the centre of the universe. Our country's policymakers are often the cause of suffering overseas - the very suffering we are fearful of at the hands of Trump - but, as citizens, we tend to take one of two paths.

We either shy away from taking responsibility, blaming it on elected officials and claiming we aren't responsible for their missteps in the Middle East and North Africa region, or we don't even have a clue about the kind of suffering our policies contribute to.

Worse than that, we are quick to judge what Arabs and Africans should and should not do while living under dictatorships as we are sitting comfortably in the democracy we love to shove down other countries' throats.

Americans have a hard time fathoming why Syrians would "abandon their country" and run from barrel bombs or why Egyptians would run from the threat of forced disappearances. We accuse refugees of "putting the lives of their children at risk" by getting into overflowing boats to escape extremism of all kinds - Islamic or otherwise -judging them harshly for these choices.

Yet, one little brush with a leader who might put us in a position even remotely close to citizens living under Bashar al-Assad, or Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, or the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, and we want the entire world to not only understand our urge to flee but also to coddle us and be concerned about our feelings.

Not unexpected

A US under Trump is not going to be pleasant, on that we can agree. However, it is not the first time minorities were targeted and unwanted in the US.

African-Americans at some point in history were denied citizenship and their movements restricted. Japanese-Americans were actually placed in internment camps on US soil.

Even ideology has been a target of US government - for example, the First Red Scare. Yet, despite this, members of these groups did not flee the US in droves.

We have had months to digest that Trump had a chance at this race. We knew minorities would be facing some type of backlash. For some reason, however, we continued to arrogantly think that a Trump presidency couldn't happen to us here in the US.

But it did, and perhaps that is what will finally force us to address and understand what it is about our political system that finally brought our aggression abroad to haunt us right here at home.

It's not that we see Trump any differently. Trump is an egotistical racist misogynist who, in a rational world, shouldn't be in any position of power. Then again, neither should Hillary Clinton.

We watched from afar (as 'afar' as the internet allows anyhow) as the 2016 presidential campaign rolled on, and, at first, we wanted Bernie Sanders to win, and were very glad to see just how much support he managed to get, but then, Bernie did two Very Bad Things; he said he was okay with Obama's Blacklist and his usage of drone strikes, and he said that he'd support Clinton if he didn't get the nomination. Some people held on to Bernie, but for many of us, for me, that was it. Bernie might still have claimed to be 'better', but he certainly couldn't claim to be 'good'.

We also watched the political establishment ignore Bernie and shove Clinton ahead of the self described 'socialist'. We watched as even people like John Oliver and the entire cast of Saturday Night Live attacked Trump viciously and tried to pave the way to a Clinton victory. Oliver even took it upon himself to attack and ridicule minor candidates like Stein & Johnson, but not Clinton. We watched as so-called liberals and so-called democrats made Clinton out to be a hero. We watched as all those people bent over backwards and pretended that Clinton was one of the good guys because they felt compelled to pick between the 'lesser of two evils'.

It was pathetic.

There's a bit of fatality involved here, to be sure, and a deep level of cynicism. Many of us feel that if America could not choose the best option, then it deserved the worst. Also, there's a harsh desire for rough truth, rather than hypocritical garnish. In a sense, many Americans are Trump, but most of them like to think of themselves as closer in character to who Clinton (falsely) claims to be; liberal, democratic, leftist, humane, charitable, kind. There are some who faced the facts honestly, and admitted that, for all intents and purposes, Clinton was a criminal and a manipulator who plays ball with the worst human rights offenders on the planet (Saudi Arabia and Israel, for example) and relies on their financial and political support. They understood that when promising to continue Obama's legacy, Clinton is in fact promising to kill another 4,000 innocent Pakistanis by drone strikes in an illegal attempt to murder untried 'terrorists'. They understand that this is a woman for whom Madeline Albright is a role model, and Kissinger is an icon, a woman who started out Republican before swapping sides and acting as though she were a Democrat, most likely because she realized that, as a woman, she could go farther as a Democrat. This is a liar who claims to have been dodging sniper fire in a foreign land when she was being greeted with flowers.

Throughout the campaign, Clinton supporters have turned a blind eye to her failings. Somehow they were more horrified by what Trump may do than what Clinton already has done.

So yeah, we weren't very excited about a Clinton victory. Nothing would change. America would continue to think itself a progressive democracy that voted in first a black man, and then a woman. The demon would continue to wear a passable face, remain...presentable.

We do not think Trump is any better, but we think a Trump victory would force the USA to admit to what it has become, and would allow other countries around the world to react appropriately now that the cover has been blown.

JFK put on a good mask but behind the mask he was a lying adulterer who lifted the weapons embargo on Israel, allowing the US to supply it with the weapons used against Palestinians. The so-called 'Special Relationship' between the USA and Israel began with JFK. His smile and charm, however, make people, even in the Arab world, look back on him with fondness. Bill Clinton was the same, all charm and smiles while he signed off on the use of military force against Americans on American soil (in Waco), and pushed the Palestinians through Oslo, and then later, in his impeachment hearings, pretended the word 'is' was ambiguous. The Bill Clinton I remember was an arrogant liar and a murderer, not a charming man at all. The latest in this series of supposed good guys is Obama, proudly black, but closer to what Malcolm X referred to as a 'house ******'. Obama did not stop the war machine, and did not close down Guantanamo. Drone usage during Obama's time has gone up exponentially, but...he performs beautifully; he cries when school shootings take place, he laughs at himself with an anger translating sketch, he dances and raps to your pleasure, he seems cool and laid back, a great dad, a fun guy.

To tens of thousands of Pakistanis though, Obama is nothing but a cold blooded murderer. To Egyptians he is just another in a long line of US presidents who support a military dictatorship, supplying it with money and weapons. To people in Yemen (the poorest Arab country), he is the man who has helped supply Saudi Arabia (ostensibly the most fascist country on Earth) with more than $100 billion in weapons with which they have destroyed Yemen. To millions of people around the world he is a bomb that happens to have a smile painted on it.

And now, finally, rather than suffer the pretense of progress under a female president, America has voted for Trump.

Good.

Lay bare the racism, lay bare the arrogance, lay bare the lies and the brutalities.

Face yourselves, see yourselves, and then maybe, maybe, things will change...

These are the people who elected Trump and these are the people whose first words are "nuke them" when they hear of a Muslim country name.

The Return of Jafar: Poll finds 41% of likely Trump voters want to bomb Agrabah - the fictional city from 'Aladdin'

BY Nicole Bitette - December 18, 2015

Call it a magic carpet-bombing ride.

A new poll asked voters if they would support bombing Agrabah - the fictional city from the Disney classic "Aladdin."

And 41% of Donald Trump supporters responded with a resounding yes!

Public Policy Polling conducted the automated national survey of presidential primary voters - and slipped in the question among more serious ones.

More than 500 people were asked the question Wednesday and Thursday, just days after the Republican candidates for the White House held their fifth nationally televised debate that focused on national security and terrorism.

Of those surveyed, 30% of Republicans supported the bombing of "the city of mystery and enchantment," while 13% were opposed. Some 57% were not sure, the poll found.

Another user questioned the fairness of the query, writing: "Ever taken a poll by phone? They probably didn't give an option for 'Agrabah Doesn't Exist.' "

But the third option of the automated poll was "not sure," which Mayhew said gave voters the opportunity to realize the question was a joke.

This isn't the first time the polling agency asked a cheeky question.

In March 2011, the PPP polled voters on Charlie Sheen's electability against President Obama and other Republican candidates. They also polled the approval rating of God, have asked if Obama was a Christian or a Muslim and included a question about the fictional paper company from the television series, "The Office."

Recently, Mayhew said they polled voters on whether or not Islam and Christianity should be illegal based on a suggestion from Ann Coulter.

PPP also polled Republican primary voters on who they prefer - and not surprisingly - Trump was on top in the wake of Tuesday's debate.

Trump, who recently called for banning Muslims from entering the country, is at 34% to 18% for Sen. Ted Cruz.

Trump also gave an ultimatum to the U.S.'s NAFTA partners: renegotiate or he will also pull out of that trade deal.

In a bold move that will likely anger many lawmakers in his own party, U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order to end the country's participation in the Trans-Pacific Partnership free trade agreement.

“What we want is fair trade,” Trump said during his meeting with executives. “And we're gonna treat countries fairly, but they have to treat us fairly.”

The announcement was initially made in a statement on the White House’s website that promises to bring jobs and economic prosperity by “rejecting and reworking failed trade deals.” Earlier this month, his team also announced they would instead be focusing on more bilateral trade deals.

“This strategy starts by withdrawing from the Trans-Pacific Partnership and making certain that any new trade deals are in the interests of American workers,” the statement reads, then delivers an ultimatum regarding its commitment to the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement, the neo-liberal wedge used to open up the Mexican market to trade by promising, and failing to deliver, economic prosperity.

“If our partners refuse a renegotiation that gives American workers a fair deal, then the President will give notice of the United States’ intent to withdraw from NAFTA,” says the statement.

The statement, titled Trade Deals Working For All Americans, emphasizes Trump’s “lifetime of negotiating experience” as a selling point for withdrawing from the 12-nation agreement, which former President Barack Obama adamantly pushed.

Except for the U.S., all other countries have signed the controversial TPP, which promises to open up markets by removing trade barriers, though it has yet to be ratified by any single one. The TPP's member countries include Australia, Brunei Darussalam, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, and Vietnam.

The deal purports to bring economic prosperity to all by equally opening borders and market opportunities. But critics argue that less developed countries, such as the three commodity-dependent Latin American members, are at an obvious disadvantage when competing against developed countries that export more costly value-added goods.

Environmentalists have also blasted the agreement for allowing member-governments to be sued by corporations claiming profit-loss due to environmental and labor regulations. Thousands of protesters have come out against the deal in Peru and Chile.

While not specifying exactly what type of regulation regarding trade agreements, during the campaign, Trump, the business-tycoon-turned-45th-president on Friday, advocated a one step forward, two steps back approach.

“For every one new regulation, two old regulations must be eliminated,” he said in November of last year.

It plays into Trump’s populist working-class rhetoric, promising to “put American workers and businesses first when it comes to trade” and cracking down on “those nations that violate trade agreements and harm American workers in the process.”

What the statement doesn’t mention is Trump’s disastrous business record, which includes dozens of failed and corrupt businesses and labor disputes over unpaid wages, to name a couple.

Leaked drafts of 4 White House executive orders on Muslim ban, end to DREAMer program, and more

1.25.2017

On Tuesday, Vox was given six documents that purported to be draft executive orders under consideration by the Trump administration. The source noted that “all of these documents are still going through formal review” in the Executive Office of the President and “have not yet been cleared by [the Department of Justice or the Office of Legal Counsel].”

We were not, at the time, able to verify the authenticity of the documents and did not feel it would be reasonable to publish or report on them.
But on Wednesday afternoon, Trump signed two executive orders on immigration that word-for-word matched the drafts we’d received.Given that our source had early access to two documents that were proven accurate, and that all the orders closely align with Trump’s stated policies on the campaign trail, we are reporting on the remaining four.

The source cautioned that “there are substantive comments on several of these drafts from multiple elements of NSC staff” and “if previous processes remain the norm, there [are] likely to be some substantive revisions.” It is possible these orders will emerge with substantial changes, or even be scrapped altogether.

We sent the White House PDFs of the documents and left voicemails with aides, but did not receive a response.

The two orders released today by the Trump administration, and delivered yesterday by our source, start the process of building President Trump's famous "wall," and make it easier for immigration agents to arrest, detain, and deport unauthorized immigrants at the border and in the US. Those policies are explained in detail here.

The four remaining draft orders obtained by Vox focus on immigration, terrorism, and refugee policy. They wouldn't ban all Muslim immigration to the US, breaking a Trump promise from early in his campaign, but they would temporarily ban entries from seven majority-Muslim countries and bar all refugees from coming to the US for several months. They would make it harder for immigrants to come to the US to work, make it easier to deport them if they use public services, and put an end to the Obama administration program that protected young "DREAMer" immigrants from deportation.

In all, the combined documents would represent one of the harshest crackdowns on immigrants — both those here and those who want to come here — in memory.

The “Muslim ban”: “Protecting the Nation From Terrorist Attacks by Foreign Nationals”

The draft executive order limiting immigration from certain Muslim-majority countries, formally titled, "Protecting the Nation From Terrorist Attacks by Foreign Nationals," suspends entry into the United States from selected countries starting 30 days after the executive order's issuance.

On the campaign trail, Trump made comments about banning Muslims from the United States. This order is reminiscent of that promise but falls far short of it, as most Muslim-majority countries, including the most populous ones (Indonesia, Bangladesh, and Pakistan), are not included on the list of barred countries.

The countries in question are those included in the State Department's list of terrorism-sponsoring countries (Iran, Sudan, and Syria), those designated by the Department of Homeland Security as countries of concern (Libya, Somalia, and Yemen), and Iraq, which is specially designated in the Visa Waiver Program Improvement and Terrorist Travel Prevention Act of 2015, the law from which the executive order gets its list of barred countries. (Syria is specially designated too, but it’s already banned due to the terrorism list.)

That law simply limited travel from countries whose residents normally don't need a visa to visit the US (which tend to be rich countries like the UK, France, and Germany) if they had previously traveled to a country of concern, like Iran or Yemen or Iraq. Trump's executive order uses that list and bars all immigration from those countries outright.

As this ban is being implemented, the secretary of homeland security, along with the secretary of state and director of national intelligence, is instructed to evaluate which countries do and don't provide enough information about visa applicants for the US to vet them for terrorism risk. Any countries that don't provide enough information, according to the secretary of homeland security, will be given 60 days to start doing so. After those 60 days, the secretary of homeland security will provide to the president a list of any countries still judged to not be providing enough information. The president will then issue a proclamation prohibiting nationals of those countries from entering the United States. This list will replace the one based on the 2015 law.

The order also suspends all refugee admissions into the United States for 120 days, as the secretary of state reviews refugee application procedures to ensure they guarantee no admitted refugees jeopardize national security. All refugee applications will be placed on hold for this 120-day period, and resumed once the secretary has issued revised procedures — except for applications from members of “religious minorities” who are being persecuted (which, in practice, will probably mean Christians in the Middle East).

Refugees will continue to be barred from countries that don't have adequate safeguards, as determined by the secretaries of state and homeland security and the director of national intelligence. Refugee claims "on the basis of religious-based persecution" will be given priority, and all admissions of Syrian refugees will be suspended until President Trump determines they can begin again. The total number of refugees allowed in fiscal year 2017 will be reduced from 110,000 to 50,000, and preference will continue to go to “religious minorities.”

The order instructs the secretary of state to provide "safe areas" in Syria and surrounding areas where Syrian nationals who have been displaced can reside. It also instructs the secretary of homeland security to speed implementation of a biometric entry-exit tracking system. Finally, the order instructs the secretary of state to "immediately suspend the Visa Interview Waiver Program," and requires interviews of all non-immigrant visa seekers.

“In order to protect Americans, we must ensure that those admitted to this country do not bear hostile attitudes toward our country and its founding principles,” the draft reads, justifying this blanket prohibition.

The draft relies on Division O, Title II, Section 203 of the 2016 Consolidated Appropriations Act, which lays out security-related exemptions to the visa waiver program, to derive that list of seven countries. In the 2016 law, Iraq and Syria are explicitly listed, Iran and Sudan are included as state sponsors of terrorism, and Libya, Somalia, and Yemen are in the “area of concern” as designated by the Department of Homeland Security.

What all seven countries also have in common is that the United States government has violently intervened in them. The U.S. is currently bombing — or has bombed in the recent past — six of them. The U.S. has not bombed Iran, but has a long history of intervention including a recent cyberattack.

It’s like a twisted version of the you-break-it-you-buy-it Pottery Barn rule: If we bomb a country or help destabilize its society, we will then ban its citizens from being able to seek refuge in the United States.

We bomb your country, creating a humanitarian nightmare, then lock you inside. That's a horror movie, not a foreign policy.

Here’s a rundown of the countries and the U.S. interventions there:

IRAN: Iran was the site of a 1953 coup that was assisted by the CIA. The coup brought the Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi to power — a dictator who ruled the country until his overthrow in the 1979 Islamic Revolution. Following that revolution, the United States government supported Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein’s war on Iran, even as he used chemical weapons against Iranians. In 1988, the U.S. Navy also mistakenly shot down an Iranian civilian airliner, killing all 290 people on board. More recently, Iran was subjected to one of the world’s first state-sponsored cyberattacks, as the Stuxnet virus was deployed against its nuclear program.

SUDAN: In 1998, the U.S. blew up the Al-Shifa pharmaceutical plant, which manufactured over half of the country’s pharmaceutical products. Although the attack was supposedly aimed at Osama bin Laden’s terrorist network, no such link ever emerged.

And consider that Iran, where al Qaeda, ISIS, and other anti-American terrorist organizations have no significant foothold, is included — but Saudi Arabia, where 15 of the 9/11 hijackers came from and which has been a funding source for extremist groups, is not included.

WASHINGTON — A federal judge in Brooklyn came to the aid of scores of refugees and others who were trapped at airports across the United States on Saturday after an executive order signed by President Trump, which sought to keep many foreigners from entering the country, led to chaotic scenes across the globe.

The judge’s ruling blocked part of the president’s actions, preventing the government from deporting some arrivals who found themselves ensnared by the presidential order. But it stopped short of letting them into the country or issuing a broader ruling on the constitutionality of Mr. Trump’s actions.

The high-stakes legal case played out on Saturday amid global turmoil, as the executive order signed by the president slammed shut the borders of the United States for an Iranian scientist headed to a lab in Massachusetts, a Syrian refugee family headed to a new life in Ohio and countless others across the world.

The president’s order, enacted with the stroke of a pen at 4:42 p.m. Friday, suspended entry of all refugees to the United States for 120 days, barred Syrian refugees indefinitely, and blocked entry into the United States for 90 days for citizens of seven predominantly Muslim countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen.

The Department of Homeland Security said that the order also barred green card holders from those countries from re-entering the United States. In a briefing for reporters, White House officials said that green card holders from the seven affected countries who ar

Mr. Trump — in office just a week — found himself accused of constitutional and legal overreach by two Iraqi immigrants, defended by the American Civil Liberties Union. Meanwhile, large crowds of protesters turned out at airports around the country to denounce Mr. Trump’s ban on the entry of refugees and people from seven predominantly Muslim countries.

Lawyers who sued the government to block the White House order said the judge’s decision could affect an estimated 100 to 200 people who were detained upon arrival at American airports.

Judge Ann M. Donnelly of Federal District Court in Brooklyn, who was nominated by former President Barack Obama, ruled just before 9 p.m. that implementing Mr. Trump’s order by sending the travelers home could cause them “irreparable harm.” She said the government was “enjoined and restrained from, in any manner and by any means, removing individuals” who had arrived in the United States with valid visas or refugee status.

The ruling does not appear to force the administration to let in people otherwise blocked by Mr. Trump’s order who have not yet traveled to the United States.

The judge’s one-page ruling came swiftly after lawyers for the A.C.L.U. testified in her courtroom that one of the people detained at an airport was being put on a plane to be deported back to Syria at that very moment. A government lawyer, Gisela A. Westwater, who spoke to the court by phone from Washington, said she simply did not know.

Hundreds of people waited outside of the courthouse chanting, “Set them free!” as lawyers made their case. When the crowd learned that Judge Donnelly had ruled in favor of the plaintiffs, a rousing cheer went up in the crowd.

Minutes after the judge’s ruling in New York City, another judge, Leonie M. Brinkema of Federal District Court in Virginia, issued a temporary restraining order for a week to block the removal of any green card holders being detained at Dulles International Airport.

In a statement released early Sunday morning, the Department of Homeland Security said it would continue to enforce all of the president’s executive orders, even while complying with judicial decisions. “Prohibited travel will remain prohibited,” the department said in a statement, adding that the directive was “a first step towards re-establishing control over America’s borders and national security.”

Around the nation, security personnel at major international airports had new rules to follow, though the application of the order appeared chaotic and uneven. Humanitarian organizations delivered the bad news to overseas families that had overcome the bureaucratic hurdles previously in place and were set to travel. And refugees already on flights when the order was signed on Friday found themselves detained upon arrival.

“We’ve gotten reports of people being detained all over the country,” said Becca Heller, the director of the International Refugee Assistance Project. “They’re literally pouring in by the minute.”

Earlier in the day, at the White House, Mr. Trump shrugged off the sense of anxiety and disarray, suggesting that there had been an orderly rollout. “It’s not a Muslim ban, but we were totally prepared,” he said. “It’s working out very nicely. You see it at the airports, you see it all over.”

But to many, the government hardly seemed prepared for the upheaval that Mr. Trump’s actions put into motion.

There were numerous reports of students attending American universities who were blocked from returning to the United States from visits abroad. One student said in a Twitter post that he would be unable to study at Yale. Another who attends the Massachusetts Institute of Technology was refused permission to board a plane. A Sudanese graduate student at Stanford University was blocked for hours from entering the country.

Human rights groups reported that legal permanent residents of the United States who hold green cards were being stopped in foreign airports as they sought to return from funerals, vacations or study abroad. There was widespread condemnation of the order, from religious leaders, business executives, academics, political leaders and others. Mr. Trump’s supporters offered praise, calling it a necessary step on behalf of the nation’s security.

Homeland Security officials said on Saturday night that 109 people who were already in transit to the United States when the order was signed were denied access; 173 were stopped before boarding planes heading to America. Eighty-one people who were stopped were eventually given waivers to enter the United States, officials said.

Legal residents who have a green card and are currently in the United States should meet with a consular officer before leaving the country, a White House official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, told reporters. Officials did not clarify the criteria that would qualify someone for a waiver, other than that it would be granted “in the national interest.”

But the week-old administration appeared to be implementing the order chaotically, with agencies and officials around the globe interpreting it in different ways.

The Stanford student, Nisrin Omer, a legal permanent resident, said she was held at Kennedy International Airport in New York for about five hours but was eventually allowed to leave the airport. Others who were detained appeared to be still in custody or sent back to their home countries.

White House aides claimed on Saturday that there had been consultations with State Department and homeland security officials about carrying out the order. “Everyone who needed to know was informed,” one aide said.

But that assertion was denied by multiple officials with knowledge of the interactions, including two officials at the State Department. Leaders of Customs and Border Protection and of Citizenship and Immigration Services — the two agencies most directly affected by the order — were on a telephone briefing on the new policy even as Mr. Trump signed it on Friday, two officials said.

The A.C.L.U.’s legal case began with two Iraqis detained at Kennedy Airport, the named plaintiffs in the case. One was en route to reunite with his wife and son in Texas. The other had served alongside Americans in Iraq for a decade.

Shortly after noon on Saturday, Hameed Khalid Darweesh, an interpreter who worked for more than a decade on behalf of the United States government in Iraq, was released. After nearly 19 hours of detention, Mr. Darweesh began to cry as he spoke to reporters, putting his hands behind his back and miming handcuffs.

“What I do for this country? They put the cuffs on,” Mr. Darweesh said. “You know how many soldiers I touch by this hand?”

The other man the lawyers are representing, Haider Sameer Abdulkhaleq Alshawi, who was en route to Houston, was released Saturday night.
Before the two men were released, one of the lawyers, Mark Doss, a supervising attorney at the International Refugee Assistance Project, asked an official, “Who is the person we need to talk to?”

“Call Mr. Trump,” said the official, who declined to identify himself.

While the judge’s ruling means that none of the detainees will be sent back immediately, lawyers for the plaintiffs in the case expressed concern that all those at the airports would now be put in detention, pending a resolution of the case.

The White House said the restrictions would protect “the United States from foreign nationals entering from countries compromised by terrorism” and allow the administration time to put in place “a more rigorous vetting process.” But critics condemned Mr. Trump over the collateral damage on people who had no sinister intentions in trying to come to the United States.

Peaceful protests began forming Saturday afternoon at Kennedy Airport, where nine travelers had been detained upon arrival at Terminal 7 and two others at Terminal 4, an airport official said. Similar scenes were playing out at other airports across the nation.

An official message to all American diplomatic posts around the world provided instructions about how to treat people from the countries affected: “Effective immediately, halt interviewing and cease issuance and printing” of visas to the United States.

Internationally, confusion turned to panic as travelers found themselves unable to board flights bound for the United States. In Dubai and Istanbul, airport and immigration officials turned passengers away at boarding gates and, in at least one case, ejected a family from a flight it had boarded.

Seyed Soheil Saeedi Saravi, a promising young Iranian scientist, had been scheduled to travel in the coming days to Boston, where he had been awarded a fellowship to study cardiovascular medicine at Harvard, according to Thomas Michel, the professor who was to supervise the research fellowship.

But Professor Michel said the visas for the student and his wife had been indefinitely suspended.

“This outstanding young scientist has enormous potential to make contributions that will improve our understanding of heart disease, and he has already been thoroughly vetted,” Professor Michel wrote to The New York Times.

“Everyone is just so heartbroken, so angry, so sad,” said Danielle Drake, the community manager for US Together, an agency that resettles refugees.

A Christian family of six from Syria said in an email to Representative Charlie Dent, Republican of Pennsylvania, that they were being detained on Saturday morning at Philadelphia International Airport despite having legal paperwork, green cards and visas that had been approved.
In the case of the two Iraqis held at Kennedy Airport, the legal filings by his lawyers say that Mr. Darweesh was granted a special immigrant visa on Jan. 20, the same day Mr. Trump was sworn in as president.

A husband and father of three, Mr. Darweesh arrived at Kennedy Airport with his family. Mr. Darweesh’s wife and children made it through passport control and customs, but agents of Customs and Border Protection detained him.

In Istanbul, during a stopover on Saturday, passengers reported that security officers had entered a plane after everyone had boarded and ordered a young Iranian woman and her family to leave the aircraft.

Iranian green card holders who live in the United States were blindsided by the decree while on vacation in Iran, finding themselves in a legal limbo and unsure whether they would be able to return to America.

“How do I get back home now?” said Daria Zeynalia, a green card holder who was visiting family in Iran. He had rented a house and leased a car, and would be eligible for citizenship in November. “What about my job? If I can’t go back soon, I’ll lose everything.”

Thousands Protest At Airports Nationwide Against Trump's Immigration Order

The mayor of Boston and Sen. Elizabeth Warren were among the protesters at Boston's Logan International Airport.

Scott Eisen/Getty Images

Thousands of protesters gathered at airports across the country Saturday to denounce President Trump's recent executive order that barred citizens of seven mostly Muslim countries: Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen, from entering the U.S. for 90 days. The order also temporarily suspended entry to all refugees for 120 days.

It also has led to the detention of legal permanent U.S. residents — or green card holders — in multiple airports. A federal judge in New York issued a stay late Saturday that allowed people stranded in airports to temporarily avoid deportation. Several people who were detained were later freed.

Protests erupted against the refugee order at airports in several cities Saturday, and some continued into Sunday morning. Demonstrations took place at airports servicing big cities, including New York, Chicago, Dallas, Denver, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, Boston and outside Washington, D.C.

Boston

Protesters at Logan International Airport in Boston Saturday

Scott Eisen/Getty Images

Boston's mayor, Marty Walsh joined protesters at Boston's Logan International Airport. He asked protesters to join him at a protest Sunday at the city's Copley Square. "Join us there, to stand with our Muslim brothers and sisters," he said.

Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, a Democrat not shy of denouncing President Trump when he was a candidate, also appeared at the Boston protest.

New York City

Thousands of protesters rally against the new immigration ban at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York Saturday.

Stephanie Keith/Getty Images

Thousands came to New York City's John F. Kennedy International Airport. Groups like the New York Immigration Coalition helped spread the word on social media. Twelve refugees were detained at the airport Saturday, according to The Associated Press.

New York's governor, Andrew Cuomo, tweeted his support. "I never thought I'd see the day when refugees, who have fled war-torn countries in search of a better life, would be turned away at our doorstep. ... This is not who we are, and not who we should be," he said in a statement.

Washington, D.C.

Protesters crowded the terminal at Dulles International Airport, located in Virginia near Washington, D.C. Producer Carmel Delshad of NPR member station WAMU was on hand.

Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe spoke to the press at the airport and released a statement, saying he urges President Trump to rescind the policy. "In the meantime, my administration will work with Attorney General Mark Herring to identify any and all legal steps we can take to oppose this dangerous and divisive policy," he said.

Protesters came to the international arrivals area of the Washington Dulles International Airport on Saturday.

Paul J. Richards/AFP/Getty Images

Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey also came to Dulles. "This will be an ongoing battle," he told the gathered crowd. "What we've seen in the first eight days of the Trump administration, is that this is going to be a long, arduous and tough fight."

Chicago

Demonstrators rallied at Chicago O'Hare International Airport.

Joshua Lott/AFP/Getty Images

"More than a dozen travelers" were detained at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport, according to the Chicago Tribune. Lawyers for the travelers told the paper that 17 people were held, but all were freed after the federal judge's order Saturday.

Hundreds of people stood outside the terminal, chanting, "The whole world is watching," the Tribune reports.

Dallas

Protesters gather at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport to denounce President Trump's executive order that bans certain immigration.

G. Morty Ortega/Getty Images

More than 800 people protested at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport on Saturday, reports Stella Chavez of member station KERA. She writes:

"The protesters stood inside the international terminal holding signs and chanting their support for immigrants.

Amira Mustafa was waiting for her mom, who arrived from Sudan after 22 hours of flying. Mustafa was upset because the news about Trump's executive order came while her mother — who's diabetic — was en route to the U.S.

'And now she is here and between us is only the wall. I can't see my mom. She is 67. What's the security in 67? She can't even walk. She's in wheelchair.'

The crowd erupted in cheers when they learned a judge had granted a request for a temporary injunction on the ban."

Los Angeles

At least seven people have been detained at the airport, and two people may have been deported, the Los Angeles Times reports. All of those detained were permanent residents or had visas, the paper says.

Protesters denouncing Trump's executive order numbered about 300, according to the AP, and held a candlelight vigil at the Tom Bradley International Terminal.

Reporter Leslie Berestein Rojas of NPR member station KPCC wrote on Twitter that protesters chanted "free them now."

About 3,000 protesters gathered at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport Saturday and continued protesting through early Sunday morning, the AP reports. NPR member station KUOW reported that "up to 13 people" have been detained at the airport.

Several tech companies are located in and around the city. Microsoft said 76 of its employees could be affected, while Amazon warned employees not to leave the country, according to the station. KUOW quoted King County Executive Dow Constantine (the county where Seattle is located) saying that in his first week President Trump "has done more damage to the prospects of Americans than any terrorist could do."

The AP also noted protests occurring in Newark, N.J., Portland Ore. and San Diego.

Refugees and green card holders detained and interrogated despite legal right to come to the US

US border agents are checking people’s Facebook pages for their political views before allowing them into the country, an immigration lawyer has claimed.

Houston-based lawyer Mana Yegani said several green card holders, who have the right to live and work in the US, were detained by border agents at American airports hours after President Donald Trump signed an executive order banning immigration from seven countries in the Middle East and Africa.

The ban affect travellers with passports from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen and also extends to green card holders who are granted authorisation to live and work in the United States, according to a Department of Homeland Security spokeswoman.

In one alleged incident a Sudanese PhD student at Stanford University in California, who has lived in the US for 22 years, was held for five hours in New York and in another a dual Iranian-Canadian citizen was not allowed to board a flight in Ottawa.

She said: "These are people that are coming in legally. They have jobs here and they have vehicles here.

"Just because Trump signed something at 6pm yesterday, things are coming to a crashing halt. It's scary."

A spokesman for the Alia told The Independent that they had heard were anecdotal reports of people’s social media accounts being targeted – this tactic had been used by border agents for several years despite doubts over whether it is constitutional.

It said they had been given visas to enter the US but were detained at JFK airport hours after Mr Trump issued the executive order.
Meanwhile in Cairo, five Iraqis and one Yemeni passenger were barred from boarding a connecting EgyptAir flight to New York and were redirected to flights back to their home countries, despite holding valid visas.

Dutch airline KLM said it had similarly refused carriage to seven passengers from Muslim countries because there was “no point taking them to the US”.

The order, signed on Holocaust Memorial Day, means Syrian refugees have been banned from entering the country indefinitely – though the White House has said it will consider admitting Syrian Christians – and the entire US refugee programme has been suspended for 120 days.

Nationals from the six other countries on the list have been banned from entering the US for 90 days.

"As far as green card holders moving forward, it doesn't affect them," White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus said Sunday morning in an appearance on NBC's Meet the Press. But he added that those green card holders could be subject to additional interviews if they frequently travel to the countries in question. "You're going to be subjected, temporarily, with more questioning," he said.

The chaotic implementation of the Friday order could be seen nationwide, as students, travelers, and businesspeople hailing from Iraq, Iran, Syria, Sudan, Libya, Yemen, and Somalia were forced to scrap travel plans. Dozens of U.S. green card holders were detained at U.S. airports, as tearful family members filled television screens Saturday awaiting their reunification. A federal judge granted an emergency stay late Saturday to prevent the deportation of those who have arrived and are in transit to the U.S. with valid visas.

CNN reported Saturday that the White House overruled the Department of Homeland Security's interpretation of the order to say that the order did include green card holders. A senior administration official told reporters Saturday that U.S. green card holders from one of the affected countries currently abroad will need to apply for a waiver before being allowed to return to the U.S. Green card holders from those countries currently in the U.S. would be required to meet with a consular officer before departing the country, the official added.

The White House defended the implementation of the order Saturday, commending the State Department and the Department of Homeland Security for their efforts. But there were obvious signs that the government agencies weren't prepared for the order's scope. Career Department of Homeland Security officials were not allowed to review the final order until late Friday, just before its release, an official said. The case-by-case waiver process was still being developed Saturday, and guidance from the agencies to airports and carriers was incomplete even late Saturday.

Travelers will be assessed at borders based on the passport they present, not any dual national status

Israeli Jews born in the seven countries included under US President Donald Trump's travel restrictions will not be banned from America, the country's embassy in Tel Aviv said Tuesday.

The executive order signed on Friday banned nationals of seven mainly Muslim countries from the Middle East and Africa for 90 days but has sparked confusion in its interpretation.

Israel is home to around 140,000 people born in the seven countries covered by the decree, including about 45,000 from Iran and 53,000 from Iraq, according to official statistics.

Many fled persecution, and the majority are now over the age of 65.

Their Israeli passports say where they were born but most do not still have the nationality of their country of birth.

The Israeli government had been seeking clarification as to whether they were included in the ban.

"If you have a currently valid US visa in your Israeli passport and were born in Iraq, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, or Yemen, and do not have a valid passport from one of these countries, your visa was not cancelled and remains valid," a US embassy statement said.

"We continue to process visa applications for applicants born in those countries, so long as they do not have a valid passport from one of those countries," it added.

However the statement also read that ultimately “authorization into the United States is always determined at the port of entry,” and, “We have no further information at this time.”

Israel is one of several countries seeking clarification about the US president’s executive order put in place last week .

On Sunday, Britain announced that its citizens were partially exempt from the ban, allowing them to travel even if they originally come from one of the seven countries.

The clarification came after Mo Farah, a Somali born four-time British Olympic gold medalist, was advised he might not be able to return to his home in the US despite not having Somali citizenship.

The order signed last Friday caught many US immigration gateways and foreign airlines by surprise, resulting in many people with legal US residency being blocked from boarding aircraft for the United States or being detained upon arrival.

The move has been deemed by some as unconstitutional and has since sparked protests at airports in major cities across America.

US Customs and Border Protection Acting Commissioner Kevin McAleenan cleared up an issue that had impacted many travelers with dual nationality, saying they could enter the United States as long as the passport they present is acceptable.

"Travelers will be assessed at our borders based on the passport that they present, not any dual national status," he said.

That clarification got a cheer from Europe's Commissioner for Migration Dimitris Avramopoulos, who tweeted after speaking by phone with Kelly: "Glad that issue of EU dual nationals is resolved."

McAleenan meanwhile said that through Monday 721 people had been denied boarding while more than 1,000 people were granted waivers from the Trump order to allow them to enter the country.

President Trump Threatens to Send U.S. Troops to Mexico to Take Care of 'Bad Hombres'

2/1/2017President Donald Trump threatened in a phone call with his Mexican counterpart to send U.S. troops to stop "bad hombres down there" unless the Mexican military does more to control them itself, according to an excerpt of a transcript of the conversation obtained by The Associated Press.

The excerpt of the call did not make clear who exactly Trump considered "bad hombres," - drug cartels, immigrants, or both - or the tone and context of the remark, made in a Friday morning phone call between the leaders. It also did not contain Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto's response.

Still, the excerpt offers a rare and striking look at how the new president is conducting diplomacy behind closed doors. Trump's remark suggest he is using the same tough and blunt talk with world leaders that he used to rally crowds on the campaign trail.

A White House spokesman did not respond to requests for comment.

The phone call between the leaders was intended to patch things up between the new president and his ally. The two have had a series of public spats over Trump's determination to have Mexico pay for the planned border wall, something Mexico steadfastly refuses to agree to.

"You have a bunch of bad hombres down there," Trump told Pena Nieto, according to the excerpt seen by the AP. "You aren't doing enough to stop them. I think your military is scared. Our military isn't, so I just might send them down to take care of it."

A person with access to the official transcript of the phone call provided an excerpt to The Associated Press. The person gave it on condition of anonymity because the administration did not make the details of the call public.

A Mexican reporter's similar account of Trump's comments was published on a Mexican website Tuesday. The reports described Trump as humiliating Pena Nieto in a confrontation conversation.

"The assertions that you make about said conversation do not correspond to the reality of it," the statement said. "The tone was constructive and it was agreed by the presidents to continue working and that the teams will continue to meet frequently to construct an agreement that is positive for Mexico and for the United States."

Trump has used the phrase "bad hombres" before. In an October presidential debate, he vowed to get rid the U.S. of "drug lords" and "bad people."

"We have some bad hombres here, and we're going to get them out," he said. The phrase ricocheted on social media with Trump opponents saying he was denigrating immigrants.

Trump's comment was in line with the new administration's bullish stance on foreign policy matters in general, and the president's willingness to break long-standing norms around the globe.

Before his inauguration, Trump spoke to the president of Taiwan, breaking long-standing U.S. policy and irritating China. His temporary ban on refugees and travelers from seven Muslim-majority countries, aimed at reviewing screening procedures to lessen the threat of extremist attacks, has caused consternation around the world.

But nothing has created the level of bickering as the border wall, a centerpiece of his campaign. Mexico has consistently said it would not pay for the wall and opposes it. Before the phone call, Pena Nieto canceled a planned visit to the United States.

The fresh fight with Mexico last week arose over trade as the White House proposed a 20 percent tax on imports from the key U.S. ally to finance the wall after Pena Nieto abruptly scrapped his Jan. 31 trip to Washington.

The U.S. and Mexico conduct some $1.6 billion a day in cross-border trade, and cooperate on everything from migration to anti-drug enforcement to major environmental issues.

Trump tasked his son-in-law and senior adviser, Jared Kushner - a real estate executive with no foreign policy experience - with managing the ongoing dispute, according to an administration official with knowledge of the call.

At a press conference with British Prime Minister Theresa May last week, Trump described his call with Pena Nieto as "friendly."

In a statement, the White House said the two leaders acknowledged their "clear and very public differences" and agreed to work through the immigration disagreement as part of broader discussions on the relationship between their countries.

How the Trump administration chose the 7 countries in the immigration executive order

By Kyle Blaine and Julia Horowitz - January 30, 2017

The seven Muslim-majority countries targeted in President Trump's executive order on immigration were initially identified as "countries of concern" under the Obama administration.

White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer on Sunday pointed to the Obama administration's actions as the basis for their selection of the seven countries. Trump's order bars citizens from Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen from entering the U.S. for the next 90 days.

"There were further travel restrictions already in place from those seven countries," Spicer said on ABC's "This Week."

"What the president did was take the first step through this executive order of ensuring that we're looking at the entire system of who's coming in, refugees that are coming in, people who are coming in from places that have a history or that our intelligence suggests that we need to have further extreme vetting for."

Restrictions from Obama years broadened to a ban

In December 2015, President Obama signed into law a measure placing limited restrictions on certain travelers who had visited Iran, Iraq, Sudan, or Syria on or after March 1, 2011. Two months later, the Obama administration added Libya, Somalia, and Yemen to the list, in what it called an effort to address "the growing threat from foreign terrorist fighters."

The restrictions specifically limited what is known as visa-waiver travel by those who had visited one of the seven countries within the specified time period. People who previously could have entered the United States without a visa were instead required to apply for one if they had traveled to one of the seven countries.

Under the law, dual citizens of visa-waiver countries and Iran, Iraq, Sudan, or Syria could no longer travel to the U.S. without a visa. Dual citizens of Libya, Somalia, and Yemen could, however, still use the visa-waiver program if they hadn't traveled to any of the seven countries after March 2011.

Trump's order is much broader. It bans all citizens from those seven countries from entering the U.S. and leaves green card holders subject to being rescreened after visiting those countries.

The executive order specifically invoked the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. A senior Trump administration official also pointed to the 2015 shooting rampage in San Bernardino, California, to justify the President's orders although neither of the attackers in the shooting would've been affected by the new ban.

Conflict of interest questions

Some also questioned whether Trump deliberately left off countries where he has business interests.

The list does not include Muslim-majority countries where the Trump Organization does business, including Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates. In financial disclosure forms during the presidential campaign, he listed two companies with dealings in Egypt and eight with business in Saudi Arabia. And in the UAE, the Trump Organization is partnering with a local billionaire to develop two golf courses in Dubai.

White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus said Sunday Trump's business ties had no influence over the countries selected for the travel ban.

"Just like I said very clearly, the countries that were chosen in the executive order to protect Americans from terrorists were the countries that have already been identified by Congress and the Obama administration," Priebus said on "Meet the Press."

He added, "That does not mean that other countries wouldn't be added later to a subsequent executive order."
Ethics lawyers say the correlation illustrates the conflict of interest Trump has created by keeping an ownership stake in his business.

"Somalia is on the list, but Saudi Arabia is not. People from Somalia are going to say that's arbitrary. And one of the factors, people are going to say, is the president does business with Saudi Arabia but not Somalia," said Richard Painter, the chief ethics lawyer in the George W. Bush administration.

White House Makes Another Tweak To Trump's Ban On Refugees And Certain Foreign Nationals

2/2/2017

It’s been less than a week since President Donald Trump signed a sweeping ban on certain foreign nationals and all refugees entering the U.S., but his administration has already had to make multiple tweaks to account for its vague language.

The administration made another change on Wednesday. A counsel to the president issued guidanceto government agencies saying theexecutive order does not apply to legal permanent residents, also known as green card holders, and that they will no longer need special waivers to re-enter the U.S. White House press secretary Sean Spicer announced the “update,” as he put it, during a daily briefing with reporters.

Trump’s initial executive order , which he signed Friday, was phrased so broadly that it affected green card holders who had left the country only to find out later that the president had tried to block their return.

The order bars most nationals of seven Muslim-majority countries ― Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen ― from entering the country for at least 90 days. It also suspends refugee resettlement for 120 days, and indefinitely blocks Syrian refugees from the United States.

The ban was applied to legal permanent residents originally from those seven countries, many of whom were initially detained upon returning to the United States. More than 1,000 of them were admitted under special waivers. Now, based on the White House guidance, those individuals will not need a waiver.

The Department of Homeland Security announced additional exceptions to the ban on Tuesday, including Iraqis who worked for the U.S. government in positions such as translators. Officials also said the ban does not apply to dual nationals of the seven countries. For example, someone with Syrian and French nationality can enter the U.S. using their French passport.

The exceptions only apply to a small fraction of the population potentially affected by the order: tens of thousands of refugees and millions of citizens of the seven countries who are still barred from visiting the U.S. to work, study, see family or receive medical care.

The initial language allowed for very few exceptions. Some Republicans particularly balked at the inclusion of legal permanent residents and Iraqis who assisted U.S. troops. Members of Congress said they received little guidance about the order, even after it went into effect.

Trump has denied that there were any issues with implementing the order. “It’s working out very nicely,” he said Saturday.

The latest change to the order came after Donald McGahn, counsel to the president, advised that there was “reasonable uncertainty about whether those provisions apply to lawful permanent residents,” Politico first reported.

President Trump wiped away 15 years of U.S. policy on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict during a White House press conference with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday afternoon, explaining his view that statehood for Palestinians is not necessary for peace.

“So I’m looking at two-state and one-state and I like the one that both parties like,” Trump said as Netanyahu audibly chuckled. “I’m very happy with the one that both parties like. I could live with either one. I thought for a while that two state looked like it may be the easier of the two, but honestly if Bibi and if the Palestinians, if Israel and the Palestinians are happy, I’m happy with the one they like the best.”

The two-state solution traditionally calls for Israel to withdraw its settlements and military occupation from internationally recognized Palestinian territories and to allow for the creation of a Palestinian state alongside Israel — thus, the two states.

The solution was first endorsed by the Palestine Liberation Organization in 1988 alongside its recognition of the state of Israel; in 2002, Republican President George W. Bush declared that the creation of a Palestinian state was official U.S. policy. Since then, the two-state solution has enjoyed bipartisan support, with President Obama picking up where Bush left off in using negotiations to pressure Israel to withdraw from Palestinian territories.

In the Trump era, that support appears to have ended. Palestinian statehood was dropped from the Republican National Committee’s 2016 presidential platform, and the president’s remarks Wednesday indicate that the United States would support a “peace” that does not include Palestinian independence from occupation — as if such a thing were possible. It also puts the U.S. government at odds with most of the world — such as the 138 countries who voted at the United Nations in 2012 to grant Palestine nonmember observer state status.

Asked about his views on Palestinian statehood, Netanyahu joked that “if you asked five Israelis” what two states would look like, “you’d get 12 different answers.”

He then insisted that he doesn’t want to deal with “labels” but rather “substance” — and that “in any peace agreement Israel must retain the overriding security control over the entire area west of the Jordan River.” This would effectively preclude withdrawing Israeli military from the occupied West Bank — and thus preclude any meaningful two-state solution.

His right-wing Likud Party has long formally opposed Palestinian statehood as a part of its platform. But during the Obama era, the prime minister claimed to support such a state as part of a comprehensive peace deal.

That claim was undermined by Israeli action. Under Netanyahu, the government of Israel allowed the settler population to grow by over 100,000. The pretense was gone during his 2015 re-election campaign, when he vowed that there would be no Palestinian state under his watch.

With the election of Trump he may finally have a president who agrees. “There is no greater supporter of the Jewish people and the Jewish state than President Donald Trump. I think we should put that to rest,” Netanyahu said, ending the press conference.

But if Trump cares about peace, he may do well to listen to the words of his own secretary of defense, Jim Mattis. In 2013, Mattis, who had just recently retired, told attendees at the Aspen Security Forum that the failure to achieve Palestinian statehood would lead to an Israeli state where a minority Jewish population governed a Palestinian population that lacked full rights.

“If I’m in Jerusalem and I put 500 Jewish settlers out here to the east and there’s 10,000 Arab settlers in here, if we draw the border to include them, either it ceases to be a Jewish state or you say the Arabs don’t get to vote — apartheid,” he said. He concluded: “That didn’t work too well the last time I saw that practiced in a county.”

Canadian Woman Turned Away From U.S. Border After Questions About Religion, Trump

'We found videos on your phone that are against us,' Fadwa Alaoui says she was told by a border agent

By Steve Rukavina - Feb 08, 2017

A woman from the Montreal suburb of Brossard says she was denied entry into the U.S. Saturday after being fingerprinted, photographed and questioned in detail about her religion and her views on U.S. President Donald Trump.

Fadwa Alaoui, a Moroccan-born Canadian citizen who is Muslim and wears a hijab, says she has used her Canadian passport to enter the United States many times without incident to visit her parents and brother, who live there.

On the weekend she was traveling with two of her children and an adult cousin, who all have Canadian passports. She said they planned to spend the day shopping in Burlington, Vt., but after four hours at the border they were turned back.
She said most of the questions that she faced at the Philipsburg border crossing focused on religion.

"I felt humiliated, treated as if I was less than nothing. It's as if I wasn't Canadian," Alaoui told CBC News in an interview Wednesday.

Morocco is not among the seven predominantly Muslim countries targeted by a U.S. travel ban introduced by Trump that is now being disputed in the courts.

Questions about religion

Alaoui said U.S. border agents asked to see her and her cousin's cellphones. They asked for the passwords and then examined the phones for about an hour. Alaoui and her cousin were then questioned separately for about 45 minutes each.

"He said, 'Do you practise? Which mosque do you go to? What is the name of the imam? How often do you go to the mosque? What kind of discussions do you hear in the mosque? Does the imam talk to you directly?'" Alaoui said.

She said she was also asked about the deadly shooting at a mosque in Quebec City and if she knew any of the victims, and what she thought of Donald Trump's policies.

Agents looked at cellphone videos
Border agents also asked her about Arabic videos on her phone. She said they were videos of daily prayers.

Alaoui said after the questioning, she waited about another hour. The border agents returned and told her she was being denied entry.
"They said, 'You're not allowed to go to the United States because we found videos on your phone that are against us," Alaoui said.

'No discrimination based on religion'

In an email to CBC, David Long, a spokesman for U.S. Customs and Border Protection, said privacy laws prohibit discussion of individual travelers.

"U.S. Customs and Border Protection's top priority is the prevention of the entry of terrorists and their weapons into the United States, while facilitating legitimate trade and travel," Long's email read.

"CBP does not discriminate on the entry of foreign nationals to the United States based on religion, race, ethnicity or sexual orientation," he continued.

He said travelers who feel they've wrongly been denied entry into the U.S. can file a written complaint on the U.S. Customs and Border Protection website.

According to the agency, an average of 1.2 million people a day try to enter the U.S. at all crossings. Of those, an average of between 300 and 500 are denied entry for various reasons.

Worried about returning to U.S.

Alaoui now wonders about returning to the U.S. to visit her parents in Chicago. She was planning to do that for spring break, but now she's not sure.

"Usually we drive about eight hours to cross at the Sarnia border. We don't want that to happen to us again after eight hours of driving," she said.

Alaoui said she hopes Prime Minister Justin Trudeau will raise the issue when he eventually meets with Trump.

Trudeau was asked in Question Period on Wednesday about Alaoui's treatment and said the federal government is working with American officials to clarify the rights of Canadians at the border.

"It's an issue everyone's concerned about here and we're working on it," he said.

Public Security Minister Ralph Goodale said his department was looking into the Alaoui situation, which he described as "troubling."

"To the best of my knowledge, this was one incident, but it's one incident too many. And I will want to examine it, but I need to get the detail of exactly who and when it happened so that I can follow it up," he said.

Goodale said he expected anyone traveling on a Canadian passport to be treated with "deference and respect" at border crossings.

Donald Trump is a Rothschild creation and actor, playing a part in the great sham that is the Illuminati’s fake election

17 February 2017

The U.S. Presidential election was rigged even before the first ballot was cast. The Rothschilds were up to their old tricks - funding both sides of the war in order to fuel chaos, derive maximum profit, and ensure they retain ultimate influence when the new order emerges.

Everybody knows Hillary Clinton was the establishment's candidate of choice, backed by the Rothschilds and the New World Order. But what is less well known is that Donald Trump is also a Rothschild creation and actor, playing a part in the great sham that is the Illuminati's fake election, designed to keep control of the people in this supposedly "democratic" society.

Political analysts have been saying that Trump's tilt for the presidency has been "thirty years in the making." This makes more sense than they realise. Thirty years ago members of the Rothschild family saved Trump from bankruptcy and took him under their wing. They recognised his potential as a "man of use" and "colourful front man" for a secretive organisation that prefers to keep itself in the shadows.

Consider how Trump built his wealth - and who supported him during his booms and busts.

"In 1987 Donald Trump purchased his first casino interests when he acquired 93% of the shares in Resorts International. Resorts International has a sordid history which began in the early 1950's when it evolved from a CIA and Mossad front company which had been established for the purpose of money laundering the profits from drug trafficking, gambling, and other illegal activities. On October 30, 1978, The Spotlight newspaper reported that the principle investors of Resorts International were Meyer Lansky, Tibor Rosenbaum, William Mellon Hitchcock, David Rockefeller, and one Baron Edmond de Rothschild."

"In 1987, upon the death of longtime CIA front man James Crosby, the nominal head of Resorts International, up-and-coming young New York real estate tycoon Donald Trump stepped into the picture and bought Crosby's interest in the gambling empire."

"Trump soon became a household name, with his colorful personality and his insistence upon naming a variety of luxury hotels, apartment houses and other commercial ventures after himself. But while the name "Trump" appeared in the headlines, the names of the real movers behind Resorts International - Rockefeller and Rothschild - remained hidden from public view."

After quickly expanding the reach of Resorts International to Atlantic City in the final years of the 1980s, Donald Trump found himself in financial trouble as the real estate market in New York tanked. The three casinos in Atlantic City, like other Trump assets, were under threat from lenders. It was only with the assistance and assurance of Wilbur L. Ross Jr., senior managing director of Rothschild Inc. that Trump was allowed to keep the casinos and rebuild his threatened empire."

This was detailed in a Bloomberg article from March 22, 1992.

The same Wilbur L. Ross, still Jacob Rothschild's right hand man, came out in support of Trump's nomination in March 2016, also reported by Bloomberg - and now he has been tapped to be Trump's Secretary of Commerce.

In another move to fill out his economic team, Trump nominated Steven Mnuchin to be his Treasury Secretary. That's the same Steven Mnuchin who spent 17 years working at Goldman Sachs, an investment firm that has produced multiple secretaries of the Treasury, before taking the helm of Trump's fundraising operation this year.

Mnuchin also worked with the man who broke the Bank of England. Billionaire globalist George Soros hired him in 2003 to start a new business, Dune Capital, focused on buying risky debt.

Both major party candidates are controlled by the globalist powers that be. You have Hillary Clinton sacrificing chickens and preparing to pay her penance to the Rothschilds. Meanwhile, Trump appears to have been bought long ago. He was made by the Rothschilds. He is paying his penance by appointing senior Rothschild men to key posts in his administration.

Either way, American citizens didn't have a choice in this election. The Illuminati have been working behind the scenes for decades creating the actors that played the roles.

This was Illuminati's plan all along. To have both candidates operating under their interests whilst systematically pitting the entire nation against each other, creating the chaos they need to push their New World Order agenda closer to completion.